FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, May 16, 2017

Faces up to 25 Years in State Prison when he is Sentenced Next Month

Acting Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez today announced that a 45-year-old Brooklyn man has been convicted of raping a 19-year-old woman on a subway platform in 1998. The defendant was charged with the rape as a result of a “cold hit” in which a DNA sample obtained from the victim’s rape kit was positively matched to the defendant’s DNA profile in the New York DNA databank.

Acting District Attorney Gonzalez said, “Thanks to the DNA evidence collected at the time of this attack the defendant has now been held accountable for this brutal rape. This case once again underscores the importance of DNA evidence in proving guilt or innocence. I’d also like to commend the victim for having the courage to testify at trial and bring this defendant to justice.”

The Acting District Attorney identified the defendant as Johnny Jacob, 45, of Brooklyn. He was convicted yesterday of first-degree rape following a jury trial before Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Dineen Riviezzo, who set sentencing for June 2, 2017, at which time he faces up to 25 years in prison.

The Acting District Attorney said that, according to trial testimony, on March 2, 1998, at approximately 9:30 a.m., the victim, who was 19 at the time and going to her first day of work, had just exited the M train at the 9th Street and Fourth Avenue stop. She was approached by the defendant, who ordered her to the back of the platform, while threatening to shoot her and placing what she believed to be a gun to her back. He forcibly raped her, then brought her outside of the train station and told her that he would kill her if she called the police.

The defendant, who was not known to the victim, then fled the scene. The victim ran to work, and her employer called 911 to report the rape. She was treated at Lutheran Hospital, where a rape kit was administered.

The defendant was arrested on October 4, 2013, after there was a DNA hit connecting the defendant to the semen found in the complainant’s rape kit. His DNA had been entered into the database following a conviction on federal money laundering charges.

The case was prosecuted by Senior Assistant District Attorney Lisa Nugent and Assistant District Attorney Tamara Marshall, of the District Attorney’s Special Victims Bureau, under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Miss Gregory, Chief.